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The BOOK OF ROBO 


Being a collection of Verses and Prose Writings by 
~ROUBAIX DeL’ABRIE RICHEY 


Pe WITH A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 
| BY HIS WIFE TINA MODOTTI 
RICHEY AND AN INTRODUCTION 

BY JOHN COWPER POWYS 





LOS ANGELES MCMXXxIIlI 








There were printed of this book two hundred and ten 
copies, of which two hundred are for sale to subscribers. 


This 1s Number 


119 




















Introduction 


No one can glance over this small volume without 
experiencing that peculiar and especial sort of sadness 
which the untimely cutting off of some delicate human 
growth, full of gracious promise, stirs up within us. 


The little book is evocative of many curious medita- 
tions. The struggle of youth is in it, the wistful im- 
patience of youth, to find its method, to find itself in its 
method, to break the opaque crust of traditional re- 
sponse to life which covers like an awkward alien skin 


_ the personal response of the wakening living creature. 


And then, just as this young classic snake, in our 
rank modern grass, is sloughing off theold skin for the 
tender new one, ecco! the dark Interrupter strides up 
and the game is finished. 


It is difficult for a literary critic turning over these 
slim pages not to be arrested by one very curious 
psychological fact, a fact that surely throws much 
pathetic light upon the great problem. 


- It would seem that the self-expression of immature 
talent finds itself more quickly, more easily, in cynical 


and satirical ways, in destructive ways, than in positive 


creation. It also appears that the traditional voices 
are more treacherous and seductive in the form of 
poetry than in the form of prose; the old haunting 


rhythms waylaying us so and the task proving so hard 
to fill the old bottles with the new wine. Here doubt- 
less there will be, in regard to this present volume, a 
poignant dividing of opinion. Those who respond easi- 
ly to the familiar strings will, and indeed must, prefer 
the verse-experiments to the prose-experiments of this 
young neophyte in the great temple. 


I cannot myself confess to sharing this choice. I 
feel as though in the more cynical pages, in the aphor- 
isms, as well as in the fragmentary prose-tale where 
the cynicism has dissolved into a sophisticated and 
wistful sadness, there is a nearer approach to that 
difficult ‘‘self-finding’ than in the more fluent 
lyrical measures. 


But whichever way one’s personal preference may 
react, it does seem that even to the most hardened 
gardener of letters there is something intriguing about 
the blossoming of a new talent on the classic tree. And 
there is something more than intriguing, there is some- 
thing sadder than one cares to realize, about the cut- 
ting off of such blossoming by the heedless frost. 


San Francisco 
December, 1922 John Cowper Powys. 








When, where, and under what circumstances, Roubaix de 
l’Abrie Richey (better known as “Robo” among his friends) was 
born, will be of little importance to the reader of this book. 
Nor will the tragic details of his early death in Mexico City 
arouse half the interest that a description of his personality 
and aspirations in life will. Perhaps the ancestor, of genera- 
tions ago, sent out to the Louisianas from France by one of 
the Louises lived again the romance of life in this young poet. 
Who can say? 


Among the simple surroundings of a country life he spent 
his childhood and early youth, with only a younger sister for 
companion and playmate. Lonely and desolate as such a life 
proved to be to a boy precociously awakened to the subtle shades 
of existence, yet it helped to develop his inborn gift for refine- 
ment and beauty and his understanding for those rare substances 
which are realities only to the dreamers and visionaries. 

One can easily picture him—a young boy with eyes dimmed 
by dreams, standing on tiptoe gazing through an old window 
at the gray sky of a winter twilight, overwhelmed by that vague 
“something which is present at all times for the soul sensitive 
enough to perceive it. And it was no doubt the overpower- 
ing force of his sensitive emotions and sensibilities that made 
him turn to art and pursue it as an outlet and a means of ex- 
pression. 

As he grew up his artistic fervor pervaded his whole being 
and personality. All of himself was in his personality. Tall, 
slender, with rarely fine aristocratic features, he always at- 
tracted attention for his simple charm and gentle manners. 
Never part of a crowd, nor happy amid one, he was at his 
best in the company of a few intimate and sympathetic friends. 

Like all persons of sensitive and tender perceptions, he 
would withdraw within himself if the least feeling of antag- 
onism was manifested, but his heart would melt with tender- 
ness and joy and the best of him would come to the surface 
when he encountered a kindred spirit. 

With Life he was never friendly. He faced it with hostility, 
and was forever endeavoring to escape its realities, and to live 


from the heart regardless of the common conception of things. 
Perhaps it was the realization of Life’s unconscious cruelty and 
indifference and his impotence to conquer Life that turned him 
against it. 

By voluntarily renouncing life at its best, he gave vent to 
ill-luck by accepting the worst. It was a negative way of de- 
fending himself—his art, his soul—from the commonplace. 


One critic in commenting on his literary work said to him: 
“T love your sardonic sadness—the ironic wistfulness and weak- 
ness. All young writers,’ he added, “try to be robust and 
strong and praise and glorify. I note that there is in your work 
always a minor key of something unattained, weak, shadowy, 
longing and hesitating, and which passes away without desires 
ever being filled or gratified, but which, after all—laughs! It 
may be the laughter of ‘beyond despair, but it laughs!” 

“But man cannot get away from facts,’ he lamented in a 
letter to a friend, quoting from Sadakichi Hartman, poet and 
friend, whom he greatly admired. “Man cannot get away from 
facts,’ he wrote. “There is a terrible threat there—facts must 
be faced and conquered lest they conquer us—yet I am irresolute 
and wavering and filled with shadows. Too long have I 
dreamed and hesitated—too long my soul shrank from those 
cold heights where nothing is concealed. Facts are not always 
beautiful, and I wish only to be beautiful. It is tenderness 
that melts my spirit. But to be free—to be clear and un- 
stained, one must have iron in his soul. Oh, the curse of shad- 
owy, dreaming, hesitating souls!’ 

Love was the greatest necessity in his life. Of a sanguine 
and ardent nature, he craved love and affection, and he him- 
self loved intensely and deeply, but not always wisely—there- 
fore he suffered much and was often misunderstood. The peo- 
ple whom he loved made an indelible mark on his life; and for 
them he never relented his interest even after circumstances, or 
other reasons, caused a final parting. Instead, whatsoever be- 
longed to the past acquired for him a deeper meaning. The 
past always held for him a fascination that the future could 
never equal. 





“T cannot lift a finger that the ghosts and dreams of yes- 
terday do not walk into my mind and whisper: There is a 
vague and terrible beauty in their asking eyes and a shadowy 
touch upon my hands that will not let them move.” 


Roubaix de l’Abrie Richey’s favorite theme of conversation 
was that old subject which has always haunted poets: “The 
way to live beautifully.” In another letter to a friend he writes 
on the subject: 

“And suddenly I conceived the beautiful life as never before. 
It appeared to me not as a thing in itself which required ease 
and wealth, but as a matter of selection—yes, a matter of selec- 
tion,—and ine is realize that I too live beautifully, live as 
beautifully as my present soul will permit. Some day, al- 
though I may be poorer and more miserable, I shall live more 
beautifully, because my sense of selection will be keener and 
my soul deeper and my craving more insatiable. A vagabond 
on the highway may live beautifully. If he gives his crust to 
the birds rather than eat it, he has already begun to live beau- 
tifully—not from any point of sacrifice, but because birds de- 
light him. He may feed only the bright feathered birds, though 
they may need and deserve it least of all, because they please 
his eyes. And yet there will be times when to live with beauty 
one must deny the eyes all. {The man who spends his money 
to buy flowers for the buttonhole of his old coat rather than 
buy a new coat and renounce the flowers, understands the 
beautiful life.) In the depth of squalor—in the hidden and for- 
gotten places without so much as a penny in one’s pocket, it is 
still possible to make beautiful selections and cast our lot with 
beauty. I am obsessed by the thought of a book I want to 
write on the subject, ‘The Art to Live Beautifully.” 

But alas! he never wrote the book, nor the many others he 
had in mind to write and which he planned for years. 

In his periods of buoyant enthusiasm he would talk by the 
hour about the plots of his books and the characters in them, 
which were more real to him than real people. They were all 
there in his mind, living and breathing his own breath; in his 
own mind he elaborated and polished them, he made them talk 


and live, but all this only in his own mind. Alas, they were 
fated never to pass that borderland! And here is just where the 
greatest tragedy of his life came in—the difficulty to express 
himself. 

All beings with deep feelings and emotions, all artists in 
particular (for what is an artist's work, after all, if not the 
expression of his innermost feelings and emotions, the reactions 
to his sensibilities and passions)—all artists in particular who, 
each in his own way, face the same struggle—will realize the 
tragedy of these words—‘‘the difficulty to express himself.” And 
Roubaix de lAbrie Richey, consummate dreamer and visionary, 
suffered bitterly the tragedy of his unexpressed emotions. 


Equally interested in writing and painting, he passed from 
one phase to the other at different periods of his life, unable to 
decide which of the two was his best medium of expression. 

In another letter (I quote much from his letters, for in their 
unpretentious way they contain real bits of beauty, and besides, 
what could describe his struggles better than his own cries of 
regret and impotence?)—“The desire to paint and write has 
taken hold of me. There are innumerable ideas haunting me 
and crying for birth—my brain is throbbing to give life to 
those images—vague, bright-colored images. I wish to run 
home and seize my palette and brushes, to hammer away on the 
typewriter, but suddenly all becomes dim and unreal—a fear, 
a doubt, takes hold of me, and I stand abashed before my can- 
vas—the paper on my machine is blank, wide and pitiless as 
the desert—my dreams have become intangible. 4 moment ago 
they were right here within reach, breathing with life—I stretch 
out my hand, and they are gone!” 

“Then the failures, the wrecks I meet on the street, seem to 
stare at me as if to convince me of the uselessness of all my 
efforts. Ah, if only we could reach up to the sky and tear 
away the smothering canopy of blue! But we only quietly 
put on our clothes every morning so that we can take them off 
again when night comes!’ 

With an intentional disregard for the modern spirit of this 
age, and of this country in particular—in which he never felt 





f 


at home but had to live, being too weak or too unlucky to at- 
tain what he desired—he finally went to Mexico, attracted by 
the beauty and the charm of the past still lingering there. 

There he found an environment better suited to his tempera- 
ment. He found sympathy and romance—but only for a little 
while. Death came, swift and inexorable, and he vanished, 
February 9, 1922, from a world in which he did not belong. 
Only the few of us who knew and loved him wish that he had 
remained. 

“Many die too late, and some die too early,’ yet strange 
soundeth the precept—‘Die at the right time’—so teacheth 
Zarathustra. 

And one wonders! Did this tireless pursuer of beauty 
and romance, this ardent lover of beautiful sounding words and 
luxurious colors—did “this weaver of thin dreams,’ which 
were to him both his life and his burden, die at the right time? 


Tina Modotti-Richey 
Los Angeles, 
December, 1922. 











Contenis 


PE ae 17 
pienuyvmer the Candle Hour... 18 
STEEP CE ee 18 
RN ee 19 
I 20 
SPOS um i ee 21 
TIDE ELIS ce I NE ene ne OCIA ee a2 
Re ADALG ei oo eee 25 
I Stand Above The City’s Tumultuous Sea... ......... 25 
I a 26 
Ne 26 
Feet That Should Have Strayed ..... ...0..0eeeeeeeeeeee eee 27 
ra FOGG 28 
(ST A STS Nl ates aps gan cee 29 
The Poet Sings To His Lost Love.........00000.2.022.222222222--- 30 
Peentero Phink Phe Rose 280 0... scs cn cee Sec cceeeeeee 30 
a TSO lies a a ARO ee 31 
SCG ee pad 
We Are The Hewers of Wo0G.. . 2 .....222..cccceeeeeeee eee 33 
tS oes 35 
Meeeey earth Reck..2 @ 37, 
i SS al ITER gl | SRA ee ca 38 
eer atien Soldier’... ee Al 
ES i 4? 
ie ere ee 44 
Some Went Through The World... . ...222222022222.22222.-- 45 
gO ea mre cece Oa lal aah ade air a A5 
Ce a ee ee AG 
Mermoucn-and Orange Juice... ee. AT 
Rem r  INOVEL ee ee 51 


MMT cea ee ee aves 





The Poet 


HE poet knows there is no knowing 
Why all things are so fair; 

The waves are only the wind a-blowing 
The mermaids emerald hair; 
The clouds but faery galleons going 
To islands in the air, 
And the silver threads of streams a-flowing 
Are things for queens to wear. 








Silently, At The Candle Hour 


ILENTLY, at the candle hour, there came 
A shadowy figure stealing from the wood 
To my threshold, with face half shrouded and stood 
Awhispering softly your silver name. 





The dusk was heavy with no other sound; 

The tapers were allayellowinthe dim... 
With my dream-dulled eyes, sadly I asked of him 
Where in all the world your love could be found. 


“Her love,” he answered me, “‘you will not find 
‘Hither in the hills, the sea or the meadows, 
“Until you twain are only two dim shadows, 
‘““Wafted, as I, upon the twilight wind.” 


OUR young face is a fragile flower 
Blown on the years no breath recalls; 
Day on day and hour on hour, 
Some leaflet sears, some petal falls. 


Some day—so soon—when all are flown, 
And I shall miss them from their place, 
Shall I, for the bright flower blown, 
Still press a kiss upon your face? 


[18] 


Ghosts 


: ’ IS not your studied image on my walls, 

| Which comes and calls 
Your mem’ry back to me 

Through all the labyrinthes of Time and Space; 

’Tis some low voice of tired violins, 

When soft, at morn, the last slow waltz begins; 
Some haunting stream of melody, 
Where floats the phantom of your face. 














’Tis not the poem of your name 
That brings again 
The old sad pain; 
’Tis some faint hint of long-forgot perfume, 
Wafted through open windows of my room, 
Of Spring’s young violets, glimmering through the 
rain. 





[19] 





Rondel 


HE Spring still chants her same gay song 
Of love, of flowers and of rain; 
She lays the same bright snares again, 
The same gay lures she’s used so long. 


I walk the glimmering fields, among 

The dripping forest and the plain: 

The Spring still chants her same gay song 
Of love, of flowers and of rain. 


The yearning wonder and the wrong 
That deep within my breast have lain, 
Awake once more and move the pain 
The silent winter stilled so long. 

The Spring still chants her same gay song. 


[20] 


A Wanderer’s Song 


HAVE slept me a sleep, 
And dreamed me a dream, 
And tramped me a tramp 
With the heart of a rover; 
But never a glint nor ever a 
Gleam 
Has warmed my heart 
The whole world over; 
Though I sought me 
And sang 
With the voice of a lover. 





O, that which I dreamed 

| And that which I sought, 

Can never be found, nor wooed, 
Nor bought, 

| By the weary tramping of 

| Weary feet— 

Two deep eyes that looked in 
Mine 

From under the ardent arbour vine 
| That first mad day, when I 
Swung me away, through the dust 
Of my native village street! 








[21] 


[22] 


Why ? 


I DID as you bid me—I departed 
Forever. 3 
I went from you and returned 


No more. 


Now 

Your face is dimmer than a 
Dim dream; 

Your name within my memory is 
Fainter than a breath. 


Why do you come then 

And sit at my table 

When the guests are gathered 
Together? 


Why do you come and sit under 
The bright lamps at my table, . 
Shaking your shadowy hair about you - 
When the feast is high with wine, 
And I would be merry? 

Why do you fix your unforgotten 
Eyes upon me with their still 
Untarnished laughter? 


Forever is a long time. 

Why have you come so soon then 
To search me out and 

Haunt me? 

















ACH night, apart by some low manger side, 
Some Saviour is conceived, some Christ is born 
Each day upon some Calvary, is crucified 
Some god; some Son of Man who dies in scorn. 
But still no stars foretell; no prophet prophesies; 
No wise men come with wond’rous gifts at morn; 
No temple veil is rent asunder when he dies. 


Each eve some young Madonna of the Street 

(For whom there was no refuge at the inn) 

Seeks some low bed with wandering weary feet 
And bears in pain some son to perish for our sin. 


I STAND above the city’s tumultuous sea, 

When soft, the sun flees out the smoky skies, 

Watching the waking windows open their bright 
eyes 

To join the mad night’s joyous revelry. 


I know that down those stone-walled channels of the 
streets, 

Tide-borne, some soul is wafted, seeking me, 

That in some steel-bound cavern, glad, expectantly, 

For me some soft hand waits; some dear heart beats. 


[25] 


AM as one who wounded in the fray, 

Turns backward from the battle’s clash and din 
To some green woodland still, and enters in, 
Casting the shield and broken sword away, 

And seeks some grassy spot where he may lay 
His scarred head down, while soft begin 

The leaves low sound, and yet more soft than they 
A small bird’s song that echoes sweet and thin. 
As one who lies thus ’neath a summer’s tree 
Drinks greedily in each gay trilled sound 

That pours from out that little feathered throat 
Who stares into the blue, and dreams, and he 
Forgetful lies of war and strife and wound— 
Heedless of all, save that low-warbled note. 


Dusk 


USK, and there looms but one pale star 

Over the bluff, and the beat of the surf 
Answers the gull’s dissenting call. 
sand dunes, eternally moving, stand 
Sentinels grim, to guard my rest. 
My thoughts are expressed by the monotone 
Of the sad salt sea in its seething sleep, 
And the roar of the onward rushing tide. 


[26] 





EET that should have strayed 
By sylvan wildernesses; 

Pale cheeks that were made 
For the warm sun’s caresses; 
How did you find your way 
Unto these aching walls, 
From where, a happy child, 
In airy country lanes you played— 
A thing so young, so pure, so wild? 
And why did you leave your play 
To wander where the scarlet lamplight falls, 
To wait so calm; so bold; so unafraid? 


And when your little, broken form is laid 
Back into the arms of the Dark Mother 
O fear not that she deny another. 


Some Urge Eternal will seek you out 
And sift you 

From the old deep calumny that clings; 

Earth in her arms will bear your being 
And lift you 

From out the ruinous wrath of things. 


[27] 


Portrait of a Poet 


OFTLY, 
over your Pan-like forehead 
—blossom-pale— 
the purple shadows of your dim hair 
fallne 


Upon the whitened, half-hid 

oval of your quiet face 

the ardent colouring of your red mouth 
gleams... 

bright as scarlet-painted poppies blowing 
before the west wind 

under the August sky; 

or the emblazoned leaves of autumn 
quivering, 

stained with the life-blood of the 
sinking year. 


Under the arching 

of your dream-drooped eyelids, 

fired by the flame of unborn fantasies, 
your deep eyes burn 

like altar tapers dimly seen 
glimmering through the lofty portals 
of some ancient shrine 

—at twilight. 

There, 

beside the ledge that frames 

the swiftly-darkening sky 


[28] 


of the yellow evening, 

I see you stand— 

your slender fingers like white flames 
tapping the cold pane ceaselessly. 


I feel what shadows of dreams 

must hover near... 

fluttering like silver moths about you 
in the shrill silence of the 

unlit room. 





Generation 


WHO have never loved this life, 

Who had reproached father and mother, 
To have given this unwelcome gift of life— 
This so great sorrow; 

Once in a hot moment, 

To her whose arms were about me 

Gave the miracle of progeny— 

The core of my being and breath. 

And so again was dragged a soul 

From that so sweet Elysium of the Unborn— 
I, who had reproached father and mother, 
Who had never loved this life, 

Condemned in a hot moment to suffer, 

The core of my being and breath. 





[29] 


The Poet Sings To His Lost Love Of The 
Web Woven Of Dreams 


EING but a weaver of thin dreams, 
It was denied me to look into your face, 

So I have taken the thin threads of my dreams, 
And woven an image of your face 
With the shuttles of my invisible loom. 
Look you through the dim web of my dreams, 
And you will behold the image of your face, 
Woven of the thin threads of my dreams. 


WEPT to think the rose would perish with the hour; 
That leaves, once life, and beauty and perfume 
Would fall away, and in the garden gloom 
Make musty mould the worms would wind through 
and devour. 
But when I thought of thee, one fairer than a rose, 
Deeper my grief than shallow streams of tears— 
Knowing the deathly fingers of the years 
Would leave thee naught but dust for the dark tomb 
to enclose. 


[30] 


Streetscape 


HE scarlet rear lamps 
Of the myriad fleeting cars 
Make pools of blood 
Upon the glimmering black pavement 
The futile drops of rain cannot wash out.. . 


A line of street lights stamps 
The long vista with bluish 
Opalescent stars.. . 





Wrapped in sleep 
A house leans heavily upon its shadows 
Like an old man leaning on a staff. . . 


The dark windows running with the rain 
Are like blind eyes that weep. .. 

And the wind as it lurches through the street 
Makes a sound 

Like a cold, hard laugh. 


[31] 





[32] 


San Francisco 


CITY of Sea 

And. Ships: 
You shall always be 
The memory of deep midnights, 
And a tramp 
Through spectral streets; 
And the damp, 
Warm pressure of lips 
Under a yellow lamp. 
Alone... 
And the sound of rain 
Striking the dumb stone; 
White faces and asking eyes 
That seek my own... 
And seek for once... 
In vain. 











E are the hewers of wood and the drawers of 
water, 
Who with bowed backs and with heads out-thrust, 
Have borne the weight of empires on our shoulders-— 
made them totter; 
And reared new palaces amid their dust. 


Ay, the imperishable pyramids that dot Sahara’s 
sands 

Are not a puny king’s proud monument, 

But ours—to the mighty labour of our unnumbered 
hands; 

Broad backs that bowed and perished as they bent. 


Nay, the mighty Caesar’s imperial, despotic lips 

Could not dominate an empire from a throne 

Had not we, in fields and mines and down in hulls of 
ships, 

Have fashioned wealth and given him of our own. 


The engine’s throb, the piston’s beat, 
The song the flywheel hums 

Is like the forward march of drums 
On factory floor and sooty street. 

The drone of a thousand thousand feet 
Tells our army comes. 


The wine that sparkles in our cups tonight 
May be the gall of future years. 


The steel that cleaves, the iron that clings 
Is the harp within our hands, 


[33] 


The singing rails, the cable strands, 

The steel-girt walls are strings 

The earth resounds; the welkin rings, 
With sound of song uproarous, 

The strokes of staggering hammer swings 
Chant the endless chorus. 


Yea, we are the drawers of water and the hewers of 
wood, who made new kings, new empires rise 
And melt away like mist before the sun; but still we 
stood | 
Always with Light Eternal in our eyes. 


[34] 








The Bohemians 





(Invocation) 


MUSE, who are we to invoke you, 
Who last night pawned your lyre 
For a few odd pennies! 
We are the same tatterdemalions 
Who have begged your bread this many a year. 


I 


Jove does not hurl his bolts at beggars; 
The winter’s snowflakes will suffice— 
And so will serve the double purpose 

Of staunching our blasphemous lips, 

And of turning old Earth pure and still; 
All without arresting the celestial scheme. 


IT 


To answer a taunt is to acknowledge equality; 
Silence is the reply which majesty gives the knave. 





III 


Come, let us chase our bubbles, friends; 

We have only a little way to run; 

Yesterday, in their shops, they told us 

That we should quickly perish. 

They are busy with their weights and their dollars, 
And will not miss our small number. 





[35] 


IV 


Leave us to our crusts and our mutton bones, 

And we will not ask for the very fine coat with the 
fur collar. 

Wine has a hundred tongues; 

So lest we tell all our secrets 

We shall drink water : 

While gazing into the eyes of our loves. 


Vv 
From our attic windows we saw the swallows 
Cutting the new air of spring 

With their swift wings, 

And we told our loves 

Of April’s green gladness, 

And sang them sonnets of the flowers. 


VI 
(L’Envoi) 

Her eyes were greener than my once-black coat, 
And I wondered what trick of the dyer’s art 
Had burned her hair that deep orange hue. 
But I shall never forget her, 
For the sake of a little word she uttered 
A long time ago, under the eaves. 


Vil 
(Epilogue) 
They knew that they had twice five fingers; 
So one day they discovered you were not amongst 
them. 


[36] 


But it chanced one saw your name 

New ’graved in marble in the market place 

And remembered that you had drunk coffee at his 
tables; | 

So he proclaimed the fact abroad, 

And it fell out that many came to imitate you, 

—So that one died a wealthy man. 


(Epitaph) 
Lichas has beaten Hercules at dice. 


ITTLE will Earth reck if you have been 
A goodly wife or a harlot— 
Whether you have worn the golden or the green, 
The purple or the scarlet. 
E’en have you sinned, she will forgive, 
In all your life eternal, 
One little crimson hour. 
And in some warm season vernal, 
She will make you live, 
Blowing in country fields agreen, 
A crimson flower. 


[37] 


Urge 


OLUMES unwritten; pictures unpainted; 

Idle days wasted in dreaming and pleasure. 
Ghosts of my brain-children, phantoms of seekings, 
Into my chambers come creeping at eve’n; 

Creaking the floor boards, rattling the curtains, 

Thumping the windows with dream-fabric fingers, 

Whispering thought-prayers in weak unborn voices— 

Wild supplications for long-delayed birthrights, 

Mad implorations to walk in the sunlight, 

Cravings to breathe in the World of Existence. 

They catch at my coat sleeves; they hang on my 
mantle, 

They drink of my breathing; they drink of my 
sweat drops 

In vain hope of finding the way of expression. 

On low-bended knee-bones of dream-fabrication 

They grovel and pray me—lI, their Jehovah! 

I, who can free them! And how they revile me! 

Deep-burning curses because I delay them. 

They mock at my waiting with weary, pinched faces; 

They scoff at my fingers grown stiff in delay; 

They laugh at my pleasures and spit in my wine 
cup— | 

I would flee from their midst but my feet cannot 
flee them. 7 


[38] 








“To A Fallen Soldter’’ 


BLADE of grass has fallen upon the breast 
Of one who went into the battle. 
Once he broke horseshoes with his bare hands; 
His strength was greater than that of all the rest; 
He lifted often a young ox, 
To show to men the strength of his arms. 


A blade of grass has fallen upon the breast 

Of you, who went into the battle, 

You who broke horseshoes with your bare hands! 

O tell me, why do you not now lift 

The blade of grass that has fallen upon your breast, 
You, who often lifted a young ox? 


[41] 


Fragments 


HE world was dead, 

The sky swung wearily like a shroud, 
And the moon was only a frightened face that fled 
On ghostly feet from cloud to cloud. 


* * % 


Over the gray grass the wind is blowing, 

While the pale weakly willows are whimpering 
And weeping their leaves under a dead sky. 

In the depths of the dark plain the pale houses 
Are hushed and huddled like snow-driven sheep; 
Over the marshy meadows the black roads bend 
At the shrine of a wayside saint. 


e * * 
I was a fool and jested among fools. 


Methinks that oft my mimicry and word 
Were naught but pebbles cast in shallow pools. 


[42] 


HE unsleeping ocean 
Upward flings 

A white arm 
To the overbending sullensky ... 
The sea birds cry; 
There is a charm 
In the slow rhythmic motion 
Of their wings. 


* * * 


You are the sea. 

You wash the shores of all the world, 
The storied coasts of India and Spain, 
And the glimmering coral strands 

Of the outermost Islands of Dream. 


* * * 


Never to make another know— 

Never to make another feel— 

How the heaving breast of the emerald sea 
Booms up to meet the keel. 


[43] 


Vers Libre | 
(After reading Carl Sandburg) 


EW songs have welled up in the mouths of men 
Filled with a new and unspeakable beauty; 
I am overcome by the unending wonder of them, 
They obsess me beyond belief, 
They haunt me for whole days together, 
Words in them have become so tangible—terrible. 


Their music is like the thunder of hammers; 
It beats upon the brain. The beauty of them 
Is like steel girders seen gleaming against the sky. 


Like mighty engines their verses throb. Swift as 

An express train their meaning rushes upon you, 

Their idea overwhelms as an army. 

They are filled with strange and wonderful words, 

Words like scimiters, gleaming keen 

They cleave the heart; they pierce through the soul; 

Orange and purple words that mirror the colour of 
Life. 


Red words that startle the eye like new-spilt blood, 
Green and lavender words that lull the senses, 
Words like mailed fists striking you full in the face, 
Forty centimeter phrases that bombard your being. 


I am overcome by the unending wonder of them;. 
They obsess me beyond belief; 

They haunt me for whole days together, 

Have they become so tangible—terrible. 


[44] 


ie went through the world saying of the lilies, 

“They toil not, neither do they spin, yet naught 
under Heaven is arrayed like them.’’ And the sea, 
and the streams and the earth, and man and the 
birds and the beasts—all that travail and labour 
were sore wroth. 


And they came unto the Lord of Creation saying: 
We have travailed and laboured, yet are we not as 
the lilies who toil not nor travail not. 

And the Lord of Creation said: ‘‘Surely the lilies 
have contributed their alloted share. Moreover 
have they suffered more greatly than you—having 
been born into the world, beautiful. 


A Discord 


We are often ashamed of, and take great pains 
to conceal the truth concerning the most trivial and 
innocent things of life; our name, our relatives, our 
environments and our sincere thoughts. At the same 
time we often admit—nay, boast, even, of disgrace- 
ful scenes, crimes and petty meannesses—all de- 
pending on their harmony with the character-part 
which we decided to play in the world. What is out 
of key we reject. That is man’s primal instinct for 
art. 


[45] 


Rouge Et Nour 


Red and black. Black and red. First it’s red 
and then it’s black, and then it’s red and black, and 
then the wheel begins to turn very slowly at first, 
and then faster and faster until I see only a blackish 
red blur, the colour of clotted blood, which grows 
darker and darker and darker until it’s all black, 
and there is not a spot of colour to be seen nor any 
light, and people are crowding me so closely I cannot 
get through nor get my breath. I fight and shove 
with my elbows and cry out, but before I can get to 
the table I hear the croupier’s voice saying that the 
play is closed, and then I hear him again and this 
time it seems that he is a long ways off announcing 
the winning number, but I can never make out quite 
just what number it is nor which colour won, 
whether it was the red or the black. 


[46] 


Vermouth and Orange Juice 


Definition for an Idealist: a Cynic in embryo. 
* * * 


Shun the appearance of evil—and you will be called 
a sly rogue. 
* * * 
A woman may jeopardize her virtue but never her 
complexion. — 
* * * 
Women should abandon their resentment toward 
the great philosophers. They never seem so charming 
as when one has been reading Schopenhauer. 


aS * * 


’*Tis true that men often owe much of their success 
and fame to the part which their wives play in their 
lives—a part for which they do not always receive 
credit. Whoever has thought to attribute to Xantippe 
her due for making Socrates the great philosopher he 
was. Ng 

The home is called the “Modern Temple.” If we 
remember rightly it was at the doorway of the ancient 
temple that men removed their sandals and entered 
with fear and trembling. 


* * * 
People marry for what they believe and divorce for 
what they know. 
* * * 
The good die young—having found, possibly, no in- 
centive for living. 
* * * 
Every pleasure has its Puritan. 


Every wise man keeps a memorandum of what to 
forget. 


[47] 


A cynic is a man who has received the confidences 


of many women. 
a * * 


Marriage: one of life’s little examples of compensa- 


tory justice. 
* * * 


Man is the only animal that reforms. 
i she 
A coquette is a woman who realizes that the entice- 
ments of love lie in their uncertainty. 
* %* * 


That divorcees are soon remarried is due to man’s 
pride in achievement. He wishes to succeed where 
others have failed. 

* * * 


The Naked Truth might win a larger male follow- 
ing in a modern gown. 


* % * 
The unpardonable sins are those unbecoming to us. 


* %* * 


Men marry for the same reason for which women 
divorce—ennui. 


* * * 
The unhappiest are those who have no regrets. 
ok * * 
A Fiancee: a compromise with the Ideal. 
*% * * 
Fiance: a compromise with Hope. 
* ok k : 
To have one’s husband fall in love with one all over 
again.... to be served with blanc mange twice on the 


same afternoon.... how the little repetitions of life 
annoy one! 


[48] 


All things come to him who waits—even the realiza- 
tion of the futility of waiting. 


* * * 


When we have run the gamut of dissipations; when 
we have exhausted all experiences and they no longer 
tempt, there is still one avenue of escape from ennui— 
reform. 7 

* * v 
Definition for Immorality: the realization that one 


is a mammal. 
* * * 


One of the discouragements of the virtuous life is 
that in old age we shall have nothing to confess. 
x * * 


Democracy: the theory that a sufficient number of 
wrongs can make a right. 


* * * 


Some day women will strive for the lost art of being 
feminine as much as they now strive for the vote. 


* * 4. 
Marriage: the act of Neophytes or Supercynics. 
* * ot: 


Definition for Respect: the manner we accord a 
man through fear, force of habit, hope of gain, or to 
please our own vanity. 

* * * 

We can, and often do, forgive those injuries com- 
mitted against us from avowed malice, but never on 
any account those acts done ‘for our own good.” 

* * * 

If we live long enough we live to see our successful 

rival pay the prices of his conquest. 
sf oe * 


Women repent of one folly by committing another. 


[49] 


Virtue and many other things are their own reward. 
Unfortunately it is not always so with that greatest 
of human emotions—love. Too often it ends in mar- 
riage. eS 


When a man has turned sixty he no longer has any 
illusions regarding life—also, he no longer needs them. 
* % * 

All wives mistrust the husband who was an ardent 
lover. And since all wives imagine that their husbands 
wooed them ardently all husbands are mistrusted. 

* * # 


It is often said that the most beautiful women are 
seldom clever. It may be remembered that they do not 
find cleverness necessary. 


ok * 


A woman secretly never quite forgives her husband 
for poverty; a man secretly never quite forgives his 


wife for her age. 
oK * 


Whatever may be said against the muchly mar- 

ried, they cannot be accused of misanthropy. 
% mk * 

It is recorded that once a man in the basket of a 
captive balloon became frightened at the altitude and 
jumped out. Another man feared that he was losing 
his life to women and married. 

* * cS 
When a woman thinks of a hero she always thinks 


of the particular man with whom she is in love at the 
moment. Oftimes she is right. 


[50] 


Fragments of a Novel 


(The following notes are all that could be found of a novel 
Roubaix de L’Abrie Richey had for years intended to write. The 
hero of it (if such he can be called) was to be one of that tragic 
type of persons so often found in life: The “near genius” who 
come to this world with an over-abundance of visions and 
capacity for feeling—but who lack the ability to express them- 
selves and evolve for themselves a clear vision of life—‘super- 
fluous beings’”’ they are, who not finding themselves mentally 
equal to the world in which they live—fail—and carry the bitter- 
ness of their failures throughout life. 

And it was a sympathetic book which could convey all the 
pathos—the struggles and the agonies of such a being that the 
dead poet wanted to write. He planned it for years, but only 
these few preliminary notes were found—too few, alas, they 
are—to give even a fair idea of what the book might have been; 
but we publish them for their intrinsic merit regardless of what 
they were meant to be.) TaMsR. 


All of Vincent’s life seemed to have been a prepara- 
tion for something which never happened. 


First he was a little boy. 


Vincent was his name. It wasa yellow name. Just 
why he could not tell, but it pleased him immensely. 
And when he squinted up his eyes and thought about it, 
repeating the syllables over and over, he saw his name 
there all glittering and golden like honey in the sun, 
or the golden charm on grandfather's watch chain. 
Perhaps this was all because V was a bright, golden 
yellow letter. All the names and words he could think 
of that began with V were yellow. 


His name was in the bean field beyond the lane. He 
always saw it there in his mind’s eye, the initial letter 
large as the inverted roof of a house standing just at 


[51] 


the edge of the eucalyptus grove. And then it trailed 
away, growing smaller, letter by letter until the last 
one rested on the bank of the Jamul where it shone 
like a tiny spark. The sun seemed to always shine in 
that spot. Perhaps that was what made his name so 
golden. Anyway he was glad. 


Chester and Bob were the boys who sometimes 
came from a neighbouring ranch to play with him. 
Those were brown names and depressed him. He felt 
sorry for them. How fortunate he was to have a glit- 
tering bright name. He liked it better than any other 
in the world except Aprila’s. But that belonged to her. 
He could not have that. Besides it was a girl’s name. 
Aprila was a green name and he loved it. Anything 
green was lovely. It made you feel all empty inside 
and that you wanted to fill yourself with it but not like 
when you were hungry and ate food. You only wanted 
to put your lips upon it and breathe it in like air.... 
only different. All green things were beautiful. You 
could not help loving them. One day he had pressed 
his lips to Aprila’s cheek. She was very beautiful. He 
wondered if her beautiful green name made her like 
that. He felt very strangely when he was near her 
just as if there were little hot wires wriggling in his 
back and cheeks and it was difficult to breathe. But 
strangely enough it was a pleasant feeling. Someday 
he and Aprila were going away together in a country 
where there was no one else and everything was all 
golden and green. She had promised that she would 
go. That would be just like having the name himself 
to have her with him there, forever and forever. 


[52] 


Mama’s name was Rose. That made you think of 
the flowers, pink and scarlet and perfumed, but not 
quite like that, either. It was bigger and softer than 
flowers and wrapped you round like a tinted silk shawl. 
When you thought about that name it made you want 
to be hidden away and sleep while tears came into your 
eyes. 

There were so many colours in the world. Every- 
thing that one could think of had a colour, good and 
bad, and sorrow and joy, and names and places. Love 
and hatred. There were different kinds of love, each 
with its different colour. Love for Mamma was pink 
_and scarlet like her name. That was not the way you 
love God and the Holy Virgin Mary. That kind of love 
was white. It made one cold to think about it, like 
touching the bed sheets in winter time on damp even- 
ings. 

Every Sunday morning Vincent went with his 
grandfather to mass. They always drove there in the 
old-fashioned cart with the high wheels. In summer 
time the dust whirled up and about Vincent as he sat 
watching the yellow ribbon of road which seemed to 
slowly float past, and listened to the almost inaudible 
clicking of the spokes. In winter the hoofs of the young 
horse, Dodo, made a sound in the mud as though some- 
one had given a smacking kiss. Vincent sat huddled 
in a great coat just able to peer out beneath the brim 
of his hat. Sometimes the rain came down and he liked 
to see how it was driven by the wind. It looked as 
though slanting lines had been drawn across the hor- 
izon and there were ever so many of them. 

Vincent liked the church. It was always solemn 
and still there and he felt as though he had something 


[53] 


sweet in his mouth as soon as he entered. And then 
there was sin. On Sundays the good father talked to 
the people about sin. Vincent sat very still in the big 
pew beside his grandfather and listened to the priest’s 
words. Sin was black; not like the dull black of his 
grandfather’s coat but hard and shining like some 
beads a neighbour woman wore around her neck, and 
was like a mighty serpent which wound itself through 
everything: the woods and hills, and even into the sky. 
Sin was beautiful like black beads and moved through 
the world with a tinkling sound. 

It would be wonderful and strange to touch sin and 
feel how hard and smooth it was, only the good Jesus 
would be sad to know he thought that. Jesus had died 
to save his soul from sin. His soul was white and thin 
and shaped like a leaf, and when he died would float 
away to paradise. It was inside of him now, only no 
one could see it, even could they have looked in him, 
for the soul was invisible. 


Vincent had long wished to paint a scene of the | 
Avenue with the Countryman Building rising behind 
in the middle distance. The movement of that great 
street fascinated him. As he passed to and fro he be-. 
came obsessed by the idea of putting the whole thing 
upon canvas. It appealed to Vincent as an impressive 
and moving scene. He would put into it something of 
that hot, surging energy which seemed to be the life 
of the city. | 

After due consideration he decided that the most 
interesting period was a little after five o’clock in the 
evening when the great homeward movement of the 


[54] 


traffic began. The golden haze of evening rose then 
and bathed the whole scene in a romantic dusty light 
as though a powder of gold filtered through the air. 
The dark, glistening ribbon of the street stretched 
away like pitiless blue steel, while over it surged a 
never ending wave of vehicles with a dull clangour and 
noise. 

Behind, the four wooden stories of the Countryman 
Building rose unsteadily and presented a dirty greyish 
mass of wall from which looked out great warped win- 
dows which seemed to stare upon the world like gaunt, 
hungry eyes. Faces appeared there and then disap- 
peared. Curtains flapped idly out and in at the whim 
of the breeze. Children craned their necks and looked 
down while their shrill laughter and cries filled the air 
and mingled with the dull roar below. 


e 


He lay upon the cot in his little room and looked up 
at the stained rafters overhead. The morning wind 
moved the roses outside the white curtained window 
and they seemed to beckon him with a gentle thumping 
sound. From far and far away was borne to him the 
faintly muffled tolling of a bell. No doubt it was from 
the steeple of San Zacarias. Thoughts of his past life 
came to Vincent’s mind. One after another the scenes 
opened themselves before him; some bright and jewel- 
like, some somber and dim. 

- It seemed strange to him that he should lie there 
thinking of the past, in that room, upon that cot where 
he had so often dreamed of the future. More than ten 
years had passed away. Ten years! Or had he only 


[55] 


dreamed it over night? The thought agitated strange- 
ly his disordered mind. He started up suddenly, catch- 
ing his breath, leaning upon his elbow. No, scattered 
there about the room, hanging from the walls, over- 
flowing from a trunk were the evidences of those days 
and those years, papers, canvasses, bits of TnSTCT ae 
all in frightful disorder. 

And Vincent resting his head within his hatida felt 
a slight nervous tremor twitch his frail body as in a 
terrible lucid moment the realization came upon him 
that those dreams, those hopes were now lost to him 
forever—utterly. 


~. 


Somewhere upon oblivion’s sea the tall and stately 
ship of life was sinking. So soon above those stream- 
ing pennants brave and gay, those fluttering flags that 
gleamed from the topmost pinnacles of the masts the 
darks would close; the heedless waters roll about those 
sails once filled with the breath of the world. 


[56] 


To Roubaix de lAbrie Richey “words” had personal ana 
unexpected significances apart from their obvious meaning. He 
also sensed color in them. Whenever a word or name was 
mentioned, or seen written, he instinctively saw the color and 
the movement of it. | 

This is not a new subject any longer, for now even scientists 
uphold the theory of color in words and music, but after read- 
ing these few examples left by Roubaix de l’Abrie Richey 
one only regrets that no better advantage was taken of this 
exceptional sense in him. Even in his early youth words fas- 
cinated him and at the age of twelve he invented a language 
all his own which he called Ziziquiyana. He coined new words, 
giving them meanings according to their sound. And having 
only English to rely upon at that early period of his life, the 
supposition that he might have been influenced by foreign words 
in compiling his language must be excluded. 

Not the word itself, but the idea of the word—the syn- 
thesis of the meaning of the word—is what he tried to build 
up. So in Prostermozarumtarencmo (kitchen) he conveys the 
“spirit” of the kitchen, all its smells, noise of tin pans, its sink 
full of dirty dishes and so on. 

From the well arranged dictionary of the poet's language 
we select a few words which may prove of interest to the 
readers of this book. 


ZIZIQUIYANA ENGLISH 

Adomo, n.—that which is done, a job, a piece of work. 
Bejansky, v.—to come. 

Cabaczna, n.—candy, sweets, confectionery. 

Czunie, adj.—some. 


[57] 


Dujae, v.—to write, to sign. 
Enswanya, v.—to learn. 

Frozny, v.—to spoil, to ruin. 
Gujensky, v.—to know. 

Froznimo, n.—a botch, a blunder. 
Icshay, n.—stuff, rubbish. 

Jiker, v.—to show, to point out. 
Jikerimo, n.—something which points out. 
Jimpsy, adj.—weak, without strength. 
Kushto, v.—to toss, to sling, to throw. 
Kuyat, n.—company, a visitor. 
Nimsk—no. 

Otkapobita—a mystery, something not plain to be seen. 
Otravasky, v.—to trespass, to go over. 
Oya, adv.—quiet, still. 

Povasku, v.—to be gone. 
Prezepislozony, n.—breakfast. 
Prostremozat, n.—cook. 
Prostremozarumtarencmo—kitchen. 
Papaloi, adv.—perhaps, maybe. 
Sdowlozony, n.—dinner, second meal. 
Smootzig, adj.—dirty. : 
Spidiwitz, v.—to speak, to tell, to say. 
Uba, adv.too, over much. 

Uczna, adv.—much. 

Vasky, v.—to go. 

X evaci, n.—tobacco. 

A orsna, v.—to teach, to instruct. 
Yalenka, v.—to put in. 

Y bejansky, v.—to come in. 

Yvasky, v.—to go in. 


[58] 


Zabejansky, v.—to come away. 

Zablau, n.—drink. 

Zablat, n.—a drinker, a drunkard. 

Zadria, v.—to drive away. 

Zacarrade, v.—to dash away, to blaze away. 
Zec, n.—money, coin. 

Zotolosky, v.—to play. 

Zowkhachi, vy.—to bespatter, to cover with mud. 
Zouska, n.—a man. 

Zouskaronna, n.—a woman. 


Myrto is red, wine red, and someone who passes a thin silk, 
cloudy-like cloth over a cloudy glass as if to polish it. 


Dorothea is also wine red, as someone slips a thin piece of 
silver into a pocket as if to secrete it. 

Childs is someone holding a bowl, or a curved sensation, 
as one who cups the hands under a chin. 

Tina is wine red, and something very precious that one puts 
gently down to become more precious as they carefully put it 
down. 


Robo is a rolling motion, as the waves in the ocean or the 
curved back of a brush. 


San Francisco is a bearded man who thoughtfully strokes 
his chin. 


Europe is yellow, and a noisy wheel spinning round and 
round with ever increasing speed. 


[59] 











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